Auction(1)

As we walked, I got to know a little more about them, the city and their mercenary group. The town was named Twin Lions after the coat of arms from the two families that ruled the city. In fact, Claudia was a distant relative of the Silver Lion family which is why her pauldrons were in the shape of lions. It also seemed like their mercenary group was just one of many that flourished next to the Giant's Forest which offered all sorts of opportunities for someone willing to bet their life for money and adventure.

Their particular mercenary group was set-up so that every squad did a specific type of job. They had an escort, fighting, hunting and specialist squad. Claudia's team was the hunting squad which explained why they were so good at taking apart the Demon Hound.

As we continued to walk, we finally reached the end of the forest. We crossed the final row of trees and a seemingly endless series of plains opened up in front of us and most prominent in these plains was a city. Its' walls rose hundreds of meters in the air towering over the plains every inch of them gleaming like they were made out of polished marble.

With my enhanced vision, I could see hundreds of soldiers patrolling around these walls each unit led by someone wearing either red or silver lion pauldrons. The walls circle around an area of tens of miles wide. There were only two breaks in the uniform grandeur of this wall.

One was a magnificent gateway. Its' doors were made of some sort of black metal that gleamed as if someone polished it every day. Carved into the door was a series of intricate patterns that resembled those found on Claudia's sword giving further credence to my hunch that there was some sort of deeper significance to the patterns than just being aesthetically pleasing.

The other gap in the wall was a giant archway where a river ran through the city. On the river, I could see a constant stream of boats entering and leaving. As we got closer to the city, we merged with the stream of people heading to the gates which opened into a giant square crowded on three sides by giant buildings that were all draped in tons of different colored banners with all different sigils.

Down at the ground level of the square, were tons of small stands each selling different products. Among these stands, at the end of the square, was a building with the letters AUCTION carved into the top of the building. Claudia nudged me to get my attention,

"That's where we are heading first after the auctions are finished, you should have enough money to go anywhere in the city that you want."

Daydreaming with the anticipation all the food I was going to buy and how excellent a weapon I was going to get, I finally realized how lost I was going to be when I separated from them, so I turned and asked,

" What are you guys going to do now that we made it to the city?"

Claudia looked at me and said,

"Well, we first have to get all these scales sold off. I've never been able to see such an expensive item auctioned. Then afterward, we can give you a city tour if you agree to visit our mercenary group."

She looked at the other two as if asking for confirmation; they both nodded back making her current smile grow a little bit wider. Relieved that my problem of being lost was solved, I promised to visit their group, and we proceeded towards the auction house.

When we got close to the entrance, we had to start shoving our way through the densely packed crowd. We finally managed to get in when people started noticing the lion head pauldrons on Claudia. As soon as they spotted them, they would step out of the way. When we got to the entrance, the clerk at the door said,

"10 coppers for a stand seat or 10 silvers for a box seat."

He held out his hand waiting for payment, barely paying attention to us. I tried to get his attention to tell him I had something to sell but either the crowd was too loud, or he just didn't care because he didn't react. Finally, noticing we had not placed anything in his hand, he turned to our group and said,

"Was there anything in my directions that was unclear?"

I replied saying once again,

"I'm not here to buy anything, I have something to sell."

He gave a sigh before saying,

"An auction is just starting now, and if you want to sell something come back..."

Before he could finish his statement, he seemed to notice something. He immediately stood as straight as I have ever seen anyone stand, gave a small bow and then said,

"I did not realize that you were with a member of the silver lion family. I'll have a representative meet with you right away."

He then directed our group to a small room that had a few luxurious couches facing an intricately wooden desk. He closed the door allowing all of us to relax on the sofas. We were just starting to really relax when the door opened with a great boom. A man rushed into the room with a disordered appearance as if he had just gotten out of bed.

"Sorry for the wait, we just finished organizing this last auction, and things are a little chaotic at the moment."

He said all of this at such a pace that I'm not sure he took a single breath. He then rocked back and forth as if impatient for someone to respond. Not wanting to disappoint him, I took out one of the scales and one of the fangs before saying,

"I would like to sell a bunch of these."

Indicating what I had in my hand.